


Fashion Shopping

by mercutiglo



Category: The Penumbra Podcast
Genre: Fluff, Gifts, Other, Self Esteem Issues, Shopping, Shopping Spree
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-22
Updated: 2018-11-22
Packaged: 2019-08-27 21:29:10
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,709
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16710367
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mercutiglo/pseuds/mercutiglo
Summary: Peter and Rita go on a shopping spree





	Fashion Shopping

 

“Mistah Steel? Mistah Steeeeel? Mistah ~Steeeeeel? Mistah Steel, are you ignorin me again? How many times have I got to tell ya that that’s really quite -” The door swung open to reveal not her tired and irritated boss, but instead the tired and slightly confused man who Rita had only seen once or twice before…. “Agent Glass? What’re you doin’ here?”   
  
“Rita. My dear. Might I ask why you’re banging on Juno’s door so early in the morning? And just…. Call me Peter.” He rubbed at his eyes, trying to make it very clear that he had been asleep until moments before.   
  
“Well, it’s…. It’s noon, Mr Peter Sir. Juno said that he would go shopping with me at noon on Saturday and well it’s actually five past noon and if you need the evidence I can show it to ya I can just pull it up on my comms, I really didn’t mean to wake ya I’m very so-”   
  
“Rita Rita Rita. It’s fine, my mistake. I didn’t realize it had already gotten so late in the day. Come in while I see if I can get him up.” He stepped aside to let Rita in, shutting the door behind her and then going back towards the bedroom to see the state of his lovely heavily-sleeping lady. He was gone for a few minutes, during which Rita set about tidying up the living room, muttering about how Juno should take better care of his things and how maybe if his apartment wasn’t as much of a mess as his life was maybe he’d make it to work on time one of these days. When Peter came back into the room, he had changed into clothing acceptable for going out shopping. Specifically, a pair of black pants, a floral patterned lavender button-down, and a black blazer with silver trim. He walked over to the coat rack next to the door, pulling off a silver purse (after double checking the contents and nodding at them) and grabbing a black leather jacket. He slid on some suede black shoes to complete the ensemble and grabbed his keys. “I take it you’re ready to go then?”   
  
Rita was taken aback for a hot second, trying to sneakily look down at what she had put on. She wasn’t dressed shoddily, a pair of black skinny jeans and a maroon sweater with cat whiskers on it. By no means was it on the same caliber as what Peter was already wearing. “I mean, well, I guess I am.” They walked down the hallway and out of Juno’s apartment building. “Mistah Gl-Peter, I’m gonna be real honest with ya for a minute if that’s okay.”   
  
“Absolutely, Miss Rita. Speak your heart.”   
  
“Okay so I just wanted to let you know that usually when Mistah Steel and I go on these little shopping trips we just like, usually have a lot of fun and it’s one of the few times that I actually get to see Mistah Steel with a positive expression on his face and know that it’s actually a real smile and I just wasn’t really prepared for you to take his place because you know we do a lot of fun silly outfits and it’s just you seem very serious about fashion and clothes and like I enjoy shopping seriously as well as for fun but I was just like not emotionally prepared to seriously shop for today and I just wanted to let you know that and also let you know that if you don’t wanna you don’t have to do this like it’s totally fine I can go with Mistah Steel next week or whenever if you don’t wanna take the time to do this and also I’m just very self conscious about what kinds of clothes I like and so I hope that you won’t mock me or think it’s all too silly because I just really like a lot of color and everything and yeah.” She took a deep breath. “Also my sister has been stressin me out a lot recently and I like to take these trips to just usually Vent to Mistah Steel because I know he isn’t usually listening so you’re free to tune me out at any time as well.” They had been standing out front of Juno’s apartment building while Rita said all of this, Peter nodding along the whole time.   
  
“Rita, my dear. You have nothing to worry about. You sound like what you need is not just a fun shopping ‘lets-try-on-outfits’ trip, but a good old fashioned shopping spree. You need to take a break. Like some old Earth-show put it - you need to treat yo self. We’ll take the Ruby 7, we’ll go down to the Hyperion Mall, and we’ll have some fun, alright?”   
  
Rita immediately flushed, taken aback by Peter’s generosity. “Oh Mistah Peter you really don’t gotta do that it’s just fine I didn’t try to sound like I was complainin I was just tryin to let you know how it usually goes you don’t-”   
  
“Rita I’m insisting. We’re gonna go, we’re gonna have fun, and we’re gonna get you some fun outfits. Okay?” Peter had his hand on her back, trying to get her to start walking down the street towards where the Ruby 7 was parked, while also trying to not seem pushy about it. He had the feeling that getting her to let him buy things for her was going to be a bit tricky at first as it was.   
  
“I mean, okay, but also, what’s the catch?”   
  
“I’m sorry?”   
  
“What’s the catch? Why’re ya bein so nice to me, offerin to buy me things? Guys don’t usually do that for no reason, so I wanna know what the catch is, considering I don’t think you’re as technologically inept like Mistah Steel is, and I’m sure you do your own fair share of hacking anyways.”   
  
Peter sighed. “Rita, you were honest with me, now I’d like to be honest with you.” They had arrived at the car, Peter gesturing for Rita to get in before he started the car and continued while they drove. “There is no catch. Money is no concern of mine, Rita. As you said, I do my own fair share of hacking, and so money is just another means of getting things when I want to take the somewhat more legal route to get things. For that reason, it’s nice to be able to give the people I care for the things they want, because usually the people around me don’t share quite the same attitude towards money that I do. Now, Juno is also someone who likes to refuse when I offer to buy him things, and if I’m being a hundred percent honest, it can get to be a little infuriating sometimes, because I’m just trying to show him that I care. Now I understand that I haven’t as of yet spent as much time around you, Rita, but I can see how much you mean to Juno, and that means a lot to me as well. So, more than anything, I’m asking you to let me treat you, not just because I think you deserve it or because you’re special to Juno, but because I want to have this experience with you and I hope it’ll be fun. I think clothes show so much about a person, and who they are and what they value, and I don’t often get the chance anymore to treat someone I actually have known for more than a day. So there’s no catch, I just want you to enjoy.”   
  
Rita sat in the passenger seat for a minute in stunned silence, the wheels in her brain clearly turning, trying to piece together the various facts that Peter had just laid out for her. “Well, Mista Peter, I guess we’ve got a deal then. I will try my very best to have fun.”   
  
Peter smiled over at Rita as he put the Ruby 7 in park. “Good, because we’re here.”   
  
\----   
  
After stopping at CosmicCafe for some drinks (and Rita surprising Nureyev by getting a Vantablack Coffee, not being what he was expecting from someone who’s always so bubbly and light) they stopped at a map of the mall to plan out where they were going to go. “I was thinking that maybe we could start at Aprico, then maybe Paragon, and see where we want to go from there? It looks like Gucci is over by them if we wanted to look at some vintage Earth stuff." Rita nodded and shrugged, indicating that she didn’t really care where they went. Usually Rita was the one pushing Juno from store to store to try things on, so she figured that if Peter wanted to take charge on this little shopping adventure, then that’d be fine. As they walked towards the first shops on their list, Peter was the one talking for once while Rita walked and half-listened, hearing that he was talking about clothes but not really paying full attention, keeping her eyes out for anything she thought might be fun to make Peter try on. “Rita dear, you’re uncharacteristically quiet. Are you alright?”   
  
Rita turned to look at Nureyev, looking him over again. She felt as though there was something about the man with her that she wasn’t getting, like there was something big that she didn’t know about him and it was hiding just below the surface. “Ya, I’m alright, I’m just thinking."   
  
"Well, what are you thinking about?" They walked into their first store, Aprico, which featured a lot of what was popular on the runways on Mars recently, even if they weren't always the most practical. Rita looked around, never having actually walked in there, considering it was usually not worth it to try and make Mistah Steel try on something that someone else might like.    
  
"Well, it's just that you have very different fashion taste than Mistah Steel and I know we already talked about the whole you bein nice thing and it's just. It's not really what I prepared myself for, you know? Like sometimes you just gotta prepare yourself to deal with stubborn Mistah Steel. So I wasn't expecting someone who wouldn't be tired of doing this from the minute we got here and all that, so it's…. Refreshing, I guess you could say."   
  
Peter was busy flipping through a rack of something while Rita talked, but made it clear he was still listening. When she was done speaking, he turned around with a two big poofy skirts in hand, one a deep maroon, the other a dark midnight blue. The skirts were the kind of thing Rita always wanted to wear, but never really put in the effort to buy - lots of tulle, shorter in the front while coming down in the back, and the topmost layer glittering from silver threads that ran through the thin fabric. "Well, I'm glad that at least so far you think I'm less stubborn than Juno. However, I'm stubborn in a different way. I think reds are good on you, so you take this one," handed her the maroon skirt, "and now lets go find some tops and shoes to go with it. They don't have the best accessories here, so we'll see what we can find at Pleppa to go with." He started walking away from the skirts, and Rita just stood there, shaking her head for a little bit.    
  
They ended up finding adorable crop tops that had strips crisscrossing down the arms like ballet slippers, and Peter was in the midst of a dilemma. "Rita, would black work well with this blue? I feel like it shouldn't, but I really like it."    
  
Rita looked around the different colors of the top, and selected a shimmering silver one. "Silver is a very good color on you Mistah Peter and I think that it also pairs well with dark blues. I don't know about about this sorta top for me though." She was looking at the black one that Peter had put into her hands.   
  
Peter looked at her, eyebrows knit together in confusion. "No? Did I grab the wrong size? Do you think gold would go better? You know maroon and gold do go very well together…." He turned back towards the rack to look and see if there was a gold top.   
  
"No I just mean I'm not really a crop top kind of gal, if you get what I'm sayin'." She gave him a look that more or less said 'Please don't make me explain this let's just find a different top.'   
  
He continued to give her a perplexed look for another moment, but eventually it clicked, and he went "Oh!" before frowning, "Rita, I have to disa…." He stopped mid-sentence. He changed his expression from a frown to a kind smile. "You know what, let's see if we can find the same thing in a little bit longer of a top then, shall we?"    
  
Rita wanted to cry at how nice he was being. Almost always people tried to suggest that Rita wear crop tops, but she never really felt comfortable in them. She never really liked the way that she looked in them, and it always just made things worse when they tried to argue with her about why she should wear them, she shouldn't let her body dictate what she can and cannot wear, etc etc so having someone who actually realized that she just didn't want to who respected that was a rare gift. "Here we go, hand me that," he said, taking her out of her daydream and the crop top out of her hand, replacing it with two shirts of the same style, but had a longer body to them, one that was black as the first one had been, another one in gold. "I figure let's see how they both look."    
  
They decided to try things on, see if there were things that they didn't think looked good together. On the way there, Peter was taking an extra amount of time, picking random things off of the racks. When they got to the fitting rooms, Peter handed most of these items to Rita. "You want me to try all of these on, Mistah Peter?" There had to be at least twenty more items in her hands now. He nodded before turning and going into one of the rooms.   
  
Rita would be lying if she said she wasn't impressed with Peter's immaculate sense of style. Some of the pieces were a little more questionable, like the dress that may have had more cut outs than actual fabric, or the pair of pants that was almost entirely made out of lace (even though she did like them very much, she felt as though they showed off just a little more than she really liked.) Most of the time she would try something on, and make some sort of noise of disgust, which Peter could hear in the next changing room and each time he would yell "Come on, show me what you're wearing" and when she would show him, he would gasp and point out all the wonderful things about each outfit, making her feel better and better each time she showed him a new outfit.    
  
By the time she made it through all the outfits that Peter had grabbed for her, she had only cast away a handful, all of which she began to give reasons for and Peter would stop her, saying that she didn't need to explain herself, sometimes the clothes were just wrong. She and Peter had both picked enough items that they could wear something new every day for at least a month, so when Peter decided that they would look for shoes and accessories somewhere else, meaning that they would check out, she started to look at the tags as subtly as she could to try and see how much Peter was going to be spending on her, but he took the clothes out of her arms before she could get that far. "I told you, money is not an issue. The Kanagawa family makes plenty enough to pay for all of these clothes a thousand times over, they'll never notice where there's a little missing." He said it with a sly smile, and Rita knew that he was right, but she still felt bad about it. "You can pay me back by picking out the shoes at Pleppa" was his response when he saw that her face was still uncomfortable, and it was the response she needed to help her feel better. "I'll get this rung up, you go over there and start figuring out what you wanna look at."   
  
"You just don't want me to see the total and feel bad."   
  
Peter just smiled back at her, not telling her that she was right, but definitely leaving it up for interpretation.   
  
\----

  
The rest of their shopping trip ended up like this, and by the end of it, the two of them had a dozen bags each filled to the brim with all of their purchases. Rita had managed to pick out a number of things that Peter liked and they had made a number of outfits that matched in different color schemes, in part because those were the clothes that looked the best but also in part because they wanted to have those looks that they could both wear and remember the fun time that they had had shopping. Both of them ended up with a number of flowy skirts, a style that looks good on almost anybody but especially the two of them, as well as a variety of shoes that were not only fashionable but functional, important for being able to run after people while on a case.   
  
Peter gave Rita a ride back to her place in the Ruby 7, and he remembered all the things that she had said on the way over to the mall about her family. "Rita, my dear, it just dawned on me that we never really took the time to talk about personal matters. You said your sister was over?"   
  
Rita immediately flushed, having also forgotten about the troubles that were awaiting her back in her apartment. "Oh you know Mistah Peter it really it's not that bad it doesn't really matter all that much I'm fine it'll be fine really I just-"   
  
"Rita."   
  
"You know, I don't even really remember what I was so worked up about earlier anyways, Mistah Peter. Like I know it was something, but I honestly had such a good time today that I really don't remember what the problem was. I had actually forgotten that my sister was even at my apartment until you said something, which I'm not sayin to try and make you feel bad about bringing it up, I just. I went and forgot all about it. So don't you feel bad. I actually think that she and my mom might've gone out somewhere for lunch anyways, so I don't even think she's there right now."   
  
Peter put the Ruby 7 into park in front of her apartment. It wasn't necessarily the nicest part of Hyperion City, but it most certainly one of the worst parts either. "Do you like living here? Does Juno pay you enough? Do I need to have a talk with him?"   
  
Rita went back on the defensive. "Yes! I mean, no! I mean. I mean I like living here, yes, I think it's a sweet part of town that doesn't see as much drama as other parts, because if you get much more expensive you get celebrity drama and camera crews and everything, and if you get much cheaper then you get into areas that have police comin through all the time and it's just sort of a more crime ridden area. This is nice though, it's real close to the office, it's just a bus away from Mistah Steel's, and it's got everything I need right nearby. And yes, he does pay me enough, although I'll be honest with you Mistah Peter, I wouldn't say no if he did give me a little bit of a raise. But also I know that that's out of the question, so you don't need to be havin a talk with Mistah Steel about it at all, don't you worry."    
  
She started moving to get out of the car and grab all of her bags from the back of the car. Peter hopped out to help her grab them all. "Rita, I hope you know that if you need another shopping spree like this at any point, just let me know and I would be more than happy to do this again. I had a lovely time with you today."   
  
Rita stood there, her arms loaded with bags after she had waved off Peter's attempt to help her, finding her keys. When she found them in her purse, she looked up and smiled at him. "You know, thank you, Mistah Peter. I'll keep that in mind." Her smile dropped, and she looked down at the pavement. "When you get back, can you please make sure that Mistah Steel is okay? He's been kinda funky recently, and he gets very defensive when I ask him questions about himself and if he's okay."   
  
Peter was still smiling, but it was clear to Rita that now it was less of a happy smile and more one that held the same amount of concern. "I will, Rita. I was planning on stopping at the grocery store and picking some stuff up for him since he obviously hasn't done it himself any time recently, and I'm planning on having a talk with him, don't worry." He put his hands on her shoulders and squeezed, his best substitute for a hug considering how many things Rita was holding. "I'm sure I will see you soon enough, but don't you dare return any of these things, they're gifts, you don't have to feel bad about them."

  
Rita smiled back at him. "Alrighty then, Mistah Nureyev, whatever you say. See ya later."    


**Author's Note:**

> I love some good knowing nothing about fashion. 
> 
> This is based off the story that i wrote a while ago "What Do You Call French Toast on Mars?" where it says Peter and Rita went on a little shopping spree
> 
> Kudos/comment/all that shit (if you comment and i dont respond i love you with all my fucking heart)


End file.
